Stock Market News for Oct 15, 2024

U.S. stock markets closed sharply higher to continue its northbound journey in 2024. Market participants seemed enthused regarding earnings results of U.S. corporate behemoths to be released this week. A decline of in crude oil price also boosted investment in equities. All three major stock indexes ended in positive territory.

How Did The Benchmarks Perform?

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) rose 0.5% or 201.36 points to close at 43,065.22, marking its fresh closing high. Notably, 21 components of the 30-stock index ended in positive territory while 9 in negative zone. In intraday, the blue-chip index touched a record-high of 43,139.00. The index crossed the crucial technical barrier of 43,000 for the first time in history.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite finished at 18,502.69, gaining 0.9% or 159.75 points due to strong performance by technology giants. The S&P 500 rose 0.8% to finish at 5,859.85, reflecting a new closing high. In intraday, Wall Street’s benchmark touched a record-high of 5,871.41.

10 out of 11 broad sectors of the broad-market index ended in positive territory while one in negative zone. The Technology Select Sector SPDR (XLK), the Utilities Select Sector SPDR (XLU) and the Real Estate Select Sector SPDR (XLRE) increased 1.3%, 1.3% and 0.7%, respectively.

The fear-gauge CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) was down 3.7% to 19.70. A total of 9.55 billion shares were traded on Monday, lower than the last 20-session average of 12.05 billion. Advancers outnumbered decliners on the NYSE by a 3.66-to-1 ratio. On Nasdaq, a 2.38-to-1 ratio favored advancing issues.

Q3 Earnings Season Starts Positively

We are in the initial stage of the third-quarter 2024 earnings season. As of Oct 11, 29 companies of the broad-market index – the S&P 500 – reported their quarterly financial numbers. Total earnings of these 29 members were up 7.1% from the same period last year on 2.8% higher revenues, with 72.4% beating EPS estimates and 65.5% beating revenue estimates.

Looking Q3 as a whole, total earnings for the S&P 500 index are expected to be up 3.6% from the same period last year on 4.5% higher revenues. This would follow the 10.2% earnings growth for the index in the preceding period on 5.5% higher revenues.

Crude Oil Prices Slump

OPEC reduced its forecast for global crude oil demand in 2024 for the third consecutive times. In its latest report released on Oct 14, OPEC forecast oil demand to grow by 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2024, down from 2 million bpd in its previous forecast. The largest cartel of the world expects demand to grow by 1.6 million bpd in 2025, compared to 1.7 million bpd projected previously.

The primary reasons for this tepid outlook are heightening geopolitical conflicts in the Middle-East, worries about softening demand in China and an expected crude surplus next year. Consequently, the U.S. crude oil benchmark – the WTI crude – was down.1.89% to $74.13 per barrel and while global crude oil benchmark – the Brent crude - tumbled 1.89% to $77.55 per barrel.

Stock prices of major crude oil producers like EOG Resources Inc. EOG and Devon Energy Corp. DVN fell 0.7% and 0.2%. Both stocks currently carry a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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